I did say I would try and get at least one update in so here it is, the system of 32 w Eridani with it's two small bodies 1 A and 1 B.

They are both metal rich worlds, very silvery in colour once you get up to them although this isn't reflected in the system view.

They are both distorted somewhat rather than deformed, sort of squashed to one side;

1 A

1 B

1 A at 145km radius matches my previous smallest record, while 1 B at 146km is a close runner, in size and shape they almost match the last two from HR 745 system, although neither of these have volcanism. There's really only one item of special significance, both small moons had very large impact craters. Unfortunately the side of 1 B was in darkness so I couldn't get a decent shot of that but in size it pretty much matches the one on 1A below;

For a small moon that's a big crater, scaled up to earth size probably the equivalent of the entire continent of North America, in reality it would be surprising if the moons were still in one piece but the game doesn't allow for that, we either get rings, arguably in some cases the remnants of moons or solid moons. It would be nice to see some large moon remnants from recently broken up bodes but I don't think the game from what I understand of the stellar bodies are generated from a planetary mesh and bitmaps for the surface.

And one nice tourist shot, I haven't really got to grips with the new camera and still can't rotate, can we please have a basic mode for camera for quick shots rather than spending ages just trying to set things up only to miss the shot altogether because the sun burned out in the meantime?

Nice shots - the last one is very moody - shame about the way the camera has distorted the sun (I assume!).
How small do you imagine a moon can get?
+1 Vrep

I have heard the smallest body size that the stellar forge can procedurally generate is 100kmin radius, the smallest I know of is 138km in radius. I am prepared to believe that around 100km radius is the smallest possible. Speculating now - there are two separate factors used to generate stellar bodies, the planet mesh, this determines the shape of the planet, and the height bitmap, this determines the surface geometry, what we drive on. It's complicated, but the reason most small planets are nearly round is to do with the minimum curvature radius of the body mesh. For instance if the minimum curvature radius of the body mesh is 100km you could distort the shape of small bodies slightly larger than 100km radius but you couldn't have depressions and flat spots like you see in the 250-600km radius bodies because that would require a mesh curvature with a minimum radius of less than 100km.

If the minimum curvature radius of the body mesh is 100km then a body with exactly 100km radius should be perfectly round as any distortion in the shape would require a curvature radius of less than 100km. I expect without a major change in the way bodies are generated, at least the very small ones, we will never see procedurally generated bodies like Prometheus, Pandora and Pan, Saturns smaller moons, they would need to be hand built like the asteroid bases.

This means of course any stellar body with any axis dimension of less than 200km couldn't be generated by the stellar forge, so yes I think the smallest planets we are seeing now are near the minimum size we will ever see.

I really like the hunt for tiny planets myself. Also for the reason that they're often in really well lit places in the galaxy. Like this binary I found somewhere around the Greater Colonia region.https://u.cubeupload.com/duckofdeath/kGDPkF.png

Nice picture, do you have the system name? Did you notice if there were any other small planets/moons in the system?

It's a relatively largish body for my little report at 196km in diameter, the largest I have reported on so far by just 1km, it's just on that point where the relatively smooth but distorted small bodies start turning into potatoe shapes, see my explanation for this behaviour earlier in the thread;

There are other angles that demonstrate this better, this one for instance you can clearly see it's no longer smoothly rounded like most of the other small bodies;

It's a small metal rich world with iron magma vulcanism, it's interesting because normally a body of this size wouldn't retain it's hot core for very long, but with a one day orbital period around its primary star it is subject to extreme gravitational and tidal stresses that serve to keep small bodies like these active;

I found two active volcanic sites here, one was quite spectacular for it's activity and colour, I managed to get a very active chimney and the sun in one picture;

It's well worth a visit if you are in the area, and at only 276ly from Sol is a good destination to get your exploration career started.

If you decide to pay a visit to the volcanic sites the details are here in the geyser and fumarole thread.

It appears I have been remiss in my reporting activities and missed one out, sad! I need to correct that I think, I have visited Zuben Elschemali 1 A a while back but somehow not reported it. It's a small lopsided spheriod of 152km in radius, metal rich, no vulcanism. It's quite close to Sol, only 185ly;

It orbits a ringed landable at a fair distance, it presented a very moody and atmospheric outlook;

That's me caught up I think. My holiday ends tomorrow so I will be flying home, more updates after I get there, but at the moment I am undertaking a rather long and boring experiment on HIP 23759 9 A, later friends.

Love the picture of the ringed world balanced on the horizon
"...That's me caught up I think. My holiday ends tomorrow so I will be flying home, more updates after I get there, but at the moment I am undertaking a rather long and boring experiment on HIP 23759 9 A, later friends. "
No wifi on the plane ... ??

A small moon of 150 klm in radius in orbit around a ringed primary. The pair are 161 ls away from their star but it doesn't seem to make much difference, everything is bright here, very bright, and tinged blue.

It makes for a nice approach if you get the direction right;

Another small squashed moon, the colour on the system map doesn't give you any idea of what it is like on the surface.

I'm in the bubble for two months, and while I'm enjoying the ride, I will head out once I can afford to properly outfit my Beluga.

I am also kicking around in and near the bubble at the moment. I have entered my collection of small bodies to visit in the galaxy map and ran out of bookmarks at 130

Most of them are concentrated on a line between the core and the bubble and further out towards BP, with just a few being spread out to the very edge of the galaxy, I will add a cap of it to the post later when I am on my gaming machine. I have entered probably 80% of them but I reckon if I clear up all the bodies within 1000ly of Sol it should free up enough to enter the rest. Of course there are a couple that are going to be a little bit tricky with my current setup, way out on the rim with the nearest neighbours being 65ly away, and this old bird, my T6 explorer, just doesn't have the legs. Even with Jumponium and a near empty fuel tank I can just barely make 54ly. Of course if I threw away things like the shield generator, downgraded power plant and etc I might just be able to make it but I am betting I will need to stock a fair amount of polonium to do it.